S&P 500 Rises on Pharmaceutical Deal Despite Disappointing Data

New York-area manufacturing data did not live up to forecasts, but a $25 billion deal by pharmaceutical company Actavis Plc to buy Forest Laboratories buoyed the market. The S&P 500 rose 0.1%, to within eight points of its record close. “Weaker economic numbers have been shrugged off,” Eric Green, director of research and fund manager at Philadelphia-based Penn Capital Management, said. “It seems like the consensus view is that weather is a huge issue in the numbers. The outlook looks pretty benign right now. We can probably reach new highs in the near term in the equity markets.”